T.E. W. (terez93) reviewed The Day the Sky Fell : A History of Terrorism (Landmark Books) on + 323 more book reviews
This vital addition to the Landmark series was first published in 1983, but, sadly, there are many more events that needed to be added by way of a more recent update, chief among them 9/11, which the author witnessed in real time, as so many of us did on that tragic day. I think this was one of the few events which became a subject of the Landmark series that I was witness to, albeit from a great distance, on the opposite coast, in fact.
That said, it's also poignant to me that this book was updated to reflect events and to relate them to a generation which wasn't even alive on 9/11/2001. In that sense, young readers will never know the lost world which doesn't exist anymore: the pre-9/11 world fewer and fewer of us really remember.
As I wrote in another review for a related book on the topic - but I think the same applies here: there are few days in American history which have had such an impact on our collective national psyche: Pearl Harbor, the assassination of John F. Kennedy and perhaps, on a smaller scale, the Columbine High School shooting in 1999, which ushered in a seemingly never-ending stream of similar travesties. This book also recounts many other tragic events, in recent and more far-distant history, which no doubt also impacted equally those affected.
That said, however, I would still argue that the experience of 9/11 was decidedly different. For the first time in world history, really, nearly everyone in the US, and untold millions of others around the world, witnessed a life-altering, world-changing, event - an act of war, really - firsthand, in real time, even if only on TV, but all together, with all sharing in the horror of the same event at the same time. The events on 9/11 weren't something heard about after the fact, an aftermath viewed by the public via grainy, black-and-white newspaper images like the attack on Pearl Harbor, or a few blurry, still photographs as with the JFK assassination, until years later, when the Zapruder film was finally released.
Literally billions of people around the world witnessed the attacks in real time, as it happened. And then there were the thousands of planes still in the sky, whose passengers in limbo all had friends and loved ones on the grounds, all wondering if theirs was next, waiting to hear whether their relatives, friends, colleagues, were the next to die. I would argue, convincingly, I think, that never has an event touched so many at the same time, on such a global scale. It's something that nearly everyone in their late-20s and upward remembers. It's another "Where Were You?" event which almost everyone of that generation still recalls.
And that's perhaps the point of the book: terrorism, as it capably notes, is probably as old as human civilization. Although the term itself didn't really exist until "The Terror" of the French Revolution in the closing years of the eighteenth century, the practice of using shock-and-awe-style violence, especially against usually defenseless non-combatants - women, children, young, elderly, the most vulnerable of our respective societies - is nothing new. The practice of using what many would consider senseless violence to terrorize a population into either action or inaction, specifically for political - that is, policy ends, to usher in social, religious or political change - is as old as human society itself.
The book thus addresses some of the more well-known events, such as the Irish Troubles, Middle Eastern terrorism in the guise of Islam, the political terrorism of the French and Russian revolutions, and other events which, whether we like to admit it or not, have shaped our world and the way we live our daily lives - see the example of extreme airport security (which even many experts describe as little more than "theater" meant more as a deterrent than actual detection) by way of example.
I won't go through each of the events the book describes, because it does a fairly decent job of it. The original was written by Milton Meltzer, who has penned many of the other modern Landmark series volumes, who, like so many of us, also witnessed the events of that September day firsthand. I'm somewhat dismayed that this doesn't seem to be a very popular offering in this series, to judge from the response here: at the time of writing there are only 11 ratings and ONE review, in addition to this one. That's somewhat understandable, as a discussion of terrorism is a difficult one to raise with young people, but it's a vital one.
I think it does an admirable job, however, and serves as a good introduction for further reading, but it also serves as a good example of how to engage with potentially traumatizing and certainly controversial subject matter. It doesn't mince words, but neither is it an apology, or anything remotely like it, which I think some people were concerned about.
Books written for young people in a candid manner about this topic are not numerous, and this one does a good job of engaging with the subject in a generally unbiased and fairly-presented manner, while not holding back about the tragedy which has been wrought by these events, and, unfortunately, those which will almost undoubtedly occur in the future. Thus, being able to understand why seemingly inexplicable events like 9/11 occur can also empower young people and decrease the fear terrorism relies on to thrive and perpetuate itself.
That said, it's also poignant to me that this book was updated to reflect events and to relate them to a generation which wasn't even alive on 9/11/2001. In that sense, young readers will never know the lost world which doesn't exist anymore: the pre-9/11 world fewer and fewer of us really remember.
As I wrote in another review for a related book on the topic - but I think the same applies here: there are few days in American history which have had such an impact on our collective national psyche: Pearl Harbor, the assassination of John F. Kennedy and perhaps, on a smaller scale, the Columbine High School shooting in 1999, which ushered in a seemingly never-ending stream of similar travesties. This book also recounts many other tragic events, in recent and more far-distant history, which no doubt also impacted equally those affected.
That said, however, I would still argue that the experience of 9/11 was decidedly different. For the first time in world history, really, nearly everyone in the US, and untold millions of others around the world, witnessed a life-altering, world-changing, event - an act of war, really - firsthand, in real time, even if only on TV, but all together, with all sharing in the horror of the same event at the same time. The events on 9/11 weren't something heard about after the fact, an aftermath viewed by the public via grainy, black-and-white newspaper images like the attack on Pearl Harbor, or a few blurry, still photographs as with the JFK assassination, until years later, when the Zapruder film was finally released.
Literally billions of people around the world witnessed the attacks in real time, as it happened. And then there were the thousands of planes still in the sky, whose passengers in limbo all had friends and loved ones on the grounds, all wondering if theirs was next, waiting to hear whether their relatives, friends, colleagues, were the next to die. I would argue, convincingly, I think, that never has an event touched so many at the same time, on such a global scale. It's something that nearly everyone in their late-20s and upward remembers. It's another "Where Were You?" event which almost everyone of that generation still recalls.
And that's perhaps the point of the book: terrorism, as it capably notes, is probably as old as human civilization. Although the term itself didn't really exist until "The Terror" of the French Revolution in the closing years of the eighteenth century, the practice of using shock-and-awe-style violence, especially against usually defenseless non-combatants - women, children, young, elderly, the most vulnerable of our respective societies - is nothing new. The practice of using what many would consider senseless violence to terrorize a population into either action or inaction, specifically for political - that is, policy ends, to usher in social, religious or political change - is as old as human society itself.
The book thus addresses some of the more well-known events, such as the Irish Troubles, Middle Eastern terrorism in the guise of Islam, the political terrorism of the French and Russian revolutions, and other events which, whether we like to admit it or not, have shaped our world and the way we live our daily lives - see the example of extreme airport security (which even many experts describe as little more than "theater" meant more as a deterrent than actual detection) by way of example.
I won't go through each of the events the book describes, because it does a fairly decent job of it. The original was written by Milton Meltzer, who has penned many of the other modern Landmark series volumes, who, like so many of us, also witnessed the events of that September day firsthand. I'm somewhat dismayed that this doesn't seem to be a very popular offering in this series, to judge from the response here: at the time of writing there are only 11 ratings and ONE review, in addition to this one. That's somewhat understandable, as a discussion of terrorism is a difficult one to raise with young people, but it's a vital one.
I think it does an admirable job, however, and serves as a good introduction for further reading, but it also serves as a good example of how to engage with potentially traumatizing and certainly controversial subject matter. It doesn't mince words, but neither is it an apology, or anything remotely like it, which I think some people were concerned about.
Books written for young people in a candid manner about this topic are not numerous, and this one does a good job of engaging with the subject in a generally unbiased and fairly-presented manner, while not holding back about the tragedy which has been wrought by these events, and, unfortunately, those which will almost undoubtedly occur in the future. Thus, being able to understand why seemingly inexplicable events like 9/11 occur can also empower young people and decrease the fear terrorism relies on to thrive and perpetuate itself.
